When It All Falls Apart
by OneLife2rock
Summary: When Cragen is arrested for murder Olivia has a tough time at the idea of losing another person she cares about at work. What will happen when Elliot tries to get back into her life, will she let him in? Why did he cut her out of his life in the first place? Set in S14! some surprises along the way! I promise! Rated T for now.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Set in S14... If you have any questions let me know. I haven't written in forever so sorry if this is awful! just an idea I had for a story. this chapter is super short, but I'll update tomorrow! **

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Olivia sat in the courtroom that had, by now, emptied out. She had just been sitting there for what seemed like forever just thinking about how screwed up this whole thing was.

Cragen was accused of murdering a hooker, they had a hearing to determine his bail and he was remanded to prison for the duration of the trial. It as ridiculous, how could this be happening, obviously he wasn't guilty but this was rough on her. It had been about a year ago that Cragen told her Elliot wasn't coming back and now she was close to losing another person.

She was lost in her thoughts, _possible suspects, possible scenarios that could explain what had happened to that girl. _

_The evidence was damn good; it was a strong case against him. _She thought to herself shaking her head. _A jury would have to realize he didn't do that. That he couldn't do that, wouldn't they? _She clenched her jaw trying to keep it together.

Just then she was startled by a hand on her shoulder, she looked up and was even more surprised at who was standing there. It was Elliot.

Her breath caught and she was flooded with a bunch of more emotions, she couldn't believe he was standing here. The strongest emotion that she felt was anger, so that's what she went with.

She shot up from where she was sitting and spun around. "What the hell are you doing here?" she spat at him.

"I heard Cragen was arrested and I just wanted to see –"

"Well you're a little late" she interrupted him. She narrowed her eyes then walked past him quickly, trying to get out of there as fast as she could.

"Liv, wait." He said turning and grabbing her arm before she got a chance to walk past his reach.

'_His reflexes were still as good as ever' she_ thought. '_Damn him.' _She felt her heart start to beat faster, she was trying her best to keep her breathing steady, to not let his touch affect her or throw her off anymore than seeing him already had.

"Don't touch me and don't call me that." She growled at him pulling her arm away from his hold.

He wasn't surprised she was angry with him, it was understandable, he had left, he had hurt her, and he knew that. But he was shocked at one thing, the look in her eyes; he had never seen that in all the years he had known Olivia. His heart sunk. That look of anger and pain and betrayal paralyzed him, he couldn't move, he couldn't speak. He just stood and looked at her.

She looked at him for a second, as if she was waiting for him to say something, but before he knew it she was gone.

He had missed his chance, _again_.


	2. She's Fine

**A/N: As promised! here is chapter 2! I really wanted to sleep, but I knew I had to get this uploaded for y'all! Thanks so much for reviewing/following! Hope you guys enjoy this! I wasn't sure how to go on this chapter,****but I like how this turned out. I'll update either tomorrow or the day after! Enjoy! **

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He couldn't believe he had just let her walk away. He had thought about what he would say to her a million times, but when it mattered most he screwed it up.

He had forgotten everything he had planned to say, when he saw her. It had been such a long time since he'd seen her; he'd missed her so much and he'd missed his chance.

_He had to go after her. _

He walked out of the courtroom, looking around to see if she was still around, knowing she wouldn't be.

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He was making his way to the front of the building when he heard a familiar voice call out to him.

"Stabler, is that you?"

He turned around and saw Fin walking towards him.

"Hey" Elliot said as he smiled and nodded his head at his old friend.

"What are you doing here?" Fin asked surprised to see him.

"I heard about what happened with Cragen, and I uh… I wanted to talk to Liv, figured I'd find her here." He said looking towards an unfamiliar face headed towards them.

"Yeah you missed her, I saw her leave a few minutes ago." Fin said coldly.

"Fin, I talked to Alex, she wants –" Detective Rollins stopped mid sentence, noticing Fin was speaking with someone. She looked at the handsome sculpted man standing in front of her. _God he was good looking. _

"Rollins, this is Elliot Stabler, Liv's old partner." He said, giving Rollins a look. And turned towards Elliot, "Elliot, this is detective Amanda Rollins."

_Liv's old partner _

He never knew hearing that out loud would sound so awful.

"Nice to meet ya" Rollins said sticking her hand out towards him with a great big smile.

He smiled a light smile at her and shook her hand.

"I didn't mean to interrupt, Alex just said she wanted to talk to both of us, so…." she trailed off shrugging her shoulders and tilting her head to the side.

"Yeah, just give us a minute and I'll be right there" Fin replied.

Rollins looked over Elliot once more before turning away, taking in every ounce of him. _There was something about him. Something that made her want to learn more about him, it wasn't attraction per say, it was more a sort of curiosity. _

"It was nice meeting you Detective Rollins." Elliot said as she was walking away, trying to be polite.

"You too." She called from behind her shoulder. _So that was the Elliot Stabler, Benson's old partner. She had heard the stories from a few people. How they were the closest detectives in the squad. She was intrigued. _

"So she's new." Elliot said gesturing toward Rollins with a grin.

"Yeah, but she's a good detective." Fin said protectively

"Is she?" Elliot said rising his eyebrow

Fin rolled his eyes. "Just cause you were hot for your partner for all those years doesn't mean everyone is" he chuckled

"What are you talking about? I wasn't _hot for_ Olivia, she was just a good friend." He said defensively.

"Great friend you turned out to be" Fin said without thinking

"What's that supposed to mean?" Elliot said shifting his stance and crossing his arms.

"You know damn well what it means, you left, which I understand, but you didn't even have the decency to tell her yourself that you were leaving. You ignored her calls; you cut her out of your life. Like I said great friend."

Elliot clenched his jaw. _He wanted to punch him, but why? Everything he was saying was true._

"You don't know what you're talking about, what happened between me and Liv is none of your business. Don't try and act like you know what happened." He uncrossed his arms; shifting his weight from one side to the other. He clenched his fists, resisting the urge to hit him.

"All I know is that she trusted you, and you left her. And I don't just mean in the job. I watched her pack up your desk. I watched her try to regain her footing after you left. I've watched her come back from what you did. I watched her try and adjust to a new partner" Fin's voice trailed off and Elliot didn't hear a word more.

_New partner _

The words hit Elliot like a ton of bricks. _Of course she had a new partner, he knew that but hearing it, hearing Fin talk about her new partner, made it real._

Fin had stopped talking and was just looking at Elliot, who was staring at the floor.

"How is she?" he asked, looking up from the floor.

His tone had changed, gone was any sense of anger and now it was just filled with concern.

Fin sighed and looked at Elliot shaking his head.

"She's fine." He said with a fainthearted smile.

Elliot looked at Fin questioning his answer.

_She didn't look fine earlier. _

"Listen, I better go, but it was nice seeing ya Stabler." Fin said turning to walk away.

_She's fine. _

The words echoed in his head as he watched Fin walk away.

"Fin, wait." Elliot called out running after him.

Fin turned around and looked at Elliot.

"Do you know where she was headed, when she left?" Elliot asked

Fin sighed.

"She said she was headed to the station to finish up some paperwork." Fin said figuring it wouldn't matter if he told him or not. He'd be able to figure out she was there. That is where she spent most of her time anyways. That hadn't changed.

"Thanks." Elliot said and smiled at Fin.

_He had to talk to her. Make sure she was all right. Make her understand why he had done what he did. How he had no other choice. Let her know he never stopped caring about her._

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**_Don't forget to review! You Like it? You hate it? Let me know! _**_(on here or on Twitter! OneLife2Rock is also my twitter name! I love SVU and or EO shippers!) **Thanks for Reading!** _


	3. Distracted

**A/N: Hey guys! thanks for the reviews! thanks for following and reading and all that! sorry it took so long to update, had a hard time with this chapter. Sorry if it's terrible! Let me know what you think! **

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Olivia was sitting at her desk, staring at the giant stack of paperwork she was behind on. She couldn't focus on what she was supposed to be doing, all she could think about was _him._

He had just showed up. It was like this wasn't real. She was just going to wake up, and everything would go back to normal. Cragen wouldn't be in jail accused of murder, and Elliot wouldn't have showed up. _Some normal. _

She was confused as hell. Had she been glad to see Elliot? Had it caused her even more pain? _Yes. _

Did she regret how she had handled things? _No._

_If he had really wanted to talk to her he wouldn't have just let her leave._

She had forgotten how much she had missed him. It had been so long since she had seen him, so long since he'd left, or at least it felt like forever. She'd forgotten how much it hurt.

"I see you're really working that paperwork hard" Munch said walking over to Olivia's desk noticing that she was just staring at the papers in front of her.

"Huh?" she looked over at Munch completely confused. "Oh, yeah. I was just thinking." deciding to leave it at that.

"Everything's going to be fine, we all know he's innocent." Much replied making the assumption she was thinking about Cragen's murder trial.

Olivia gave him a questioning look at first, and then she realized Munch had been talking about Cragen. "Yeah." She smiled and nodded at him.

"I take it that isn't what you were in deep thought about a minute ago." Munch said looking behind her, now understanding what she was in a daze about.

"Well if it isn't Elliot Stabler." Munch proclaimed, walking towards him. "We all thought you had moved to the jungles of East Asia or something of the sort." He smiled and stopped next to him, putting his hand on Elliot's shoulder.

Elliot laughed, "Nice to see you as usual, John." Elliot nodded.

"You kids don't have too much fun now." He chuckled walking away, towards the elevators.

Olivia hadn't turned around. She decided the best thing to do was ignore Elliot, and just continue with her paperwork. _Yeah that was it, act busy. Maybe then he'd just go away. _

She heard footsteps headed towards her and her heart began to beat faster. She kept on shuffling her papers around and trying to act as if she was reading them. She didn't look up, but she could see him in her peripheral vision.

He sat on the corner of her desk and just watched her grabbing files and sorting through papers.

_God he missed this, missed her._

She went to grab a file from the stack of paperwork on her desk, when suddenly he grabbed it out of her hands, shut it, and put it down placing his hand on top of it.

Olivia sighed, deciding to finally give in. She looked up at him; he was grinning at her, she knew he wasn't going away.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, allowing his stare to capture hers for a brief second, before looking away.

_I'm sorry. I came to apologize, to explain why I left the way I did. The reason I couldn't see you. The reason I couldn't talk to you. _Were among the many things he wanted to say, butnone of those words came out of his mouth. He just continued to look at her.

"I uh… I wanted to see how you were."

Olivia laughed and shook her head. _Was he really trying to act like he cared? He didn't care when she had called him. He didn't care when Cragen was telling her that he had chose to leave. He didn't care when she had to pack up his desk. He didn't care when he had chose to walk the hell out of her life. _

"Don't act you like give a shit." She got up and walked past him, she needed to move, she couldn't sit still a second longer. She turned back towards Elliot and crossed her arms.

"Are you really saying that I don't care" He raised his eyebrow, walking closer to eliminate the distance she had just put between them.

"I see your detective skills are still as good as ever" she quipped narrowing her eyes.

She watched as he just stood there, trying to think of what to say next.

She rolled her eyes. _She didn't have the time or patience to deal with this. Not here, not now_.

She started to walk towards the lockers. She obviously wasn't going to get any work done. So she may as well go home.

"Liv, come on." He said responding to her walking away.

"What!" she yelled as she flipped around to face him. "What the hell do you want Elliot?" she was now walking towards him with a look of hostility he had never seen from her before, not even when she was interrogating a perp.

_She hated letting him see that she was so affected by this, by him. She had wanted to show indifference towards this, towards him. But it was useless._

"I, I just thought… we could talk." He replied sheepishly, stunned by Olivia's outburst.

"We have _nothing_ to talk about." She said gritting her teeth, trying to get a hold on her emotions.

"Oh, I think we have plenty to talk about, a whole year's worth of stuff." He joked, trying to lighten things up. _Did he really just say that? What was he doing? It was obvious she was mad, and here he was joking about it. Idiot._

"You son of a bitch, you think this is funny. Like you can just come back here and be like oh hey, I know I've ignored you for the past year and that I've been a complete ass, but let's talk and act like everything is just as it was before." she was furious with him.

"No, I didn't –"

"Hey, now… look who it is. Everyone's favorite detectives, Benson and Stabler."

They both looked and saw Brian Cassidy walking into the squad room.

"Hey. I'm glad you're here, I wanted to talk to you about this whole thing." Olivia said walking past Elliot and over towards Cassidy. "Elliot was just leaving," she said as she glared at him.

Elliot walked towards Olivia and leaned towards her "Fine Liv, but we're not done talking." He whispered in her ear.

"Like hell we are." She scowled back at him.

She watched him leave and she breathed a sigh of relief, never had she been happier to see Brian Cassidy in her life. She walked towards the room that he had gone in to.

"I thought Stabler wasn't a cop anymore." Cassidy said to Olivia as she walked through the doorway.

"He's not."

He could tell by the tone of her voice that something had happened between them.

"Alright, Alright, I get it. Touchy subject." He chuckled putting his hands up.

She rolled her eyes. "He just heard about Cragen and wanted to see what was going on, that's all."

"Oh yeah? Cause from where I was standing it sounded like you were pretty pissed at him." He leaned forward putting his arms on the table that separated the two of them.

"Have you found anything that could help us find out who set Cragen up?" she asked, changing the subject.

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**Thanks for reading! Don't forget to review! find me on twitter! ( onelife2rock) enjoy your weekend! **


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